Exactitude by Calvino

In the third memo of Calvino’s five, he describes the quality of exactitude. He explains it in having three main points: 1. A well-defined, well calculated plan for the work, 2. An evocation of clear, incisive, memorable visual images, 3. A language as precise as possible both in choice of words and in expression of the subtleties of thought and imagination. In the literal and most obvious aspect, exactitude is being as exact and concise as possible. When we write, we able to erase, delete, and rewrite in order to make a more perfect work.A work of literature can be created so that we are able to visualize the smallest details by means of using language effectively. Calvino argues that vagueness in words leads to “a loss of cognition and immediacy, an automatism that tends to level out all expression into the most generic”. He goes on to say, that even writing that appears to be vague is, in itself, a form of exactitude. He argues this point by using the vague and indefinite poems of Giacomo Leopardi. Although vague, exactitude is achieved by an enormous amount of attention that went into achieving the vagueness.

To sum up, exactitude can head in two directions:

1. in the reduction of secondary events to abstract patterns according to which one can carry out operations and domestic theorems,
2. the effort made by words to present the tangible aspect of things as tangible as possible.

This is from Setting Sail.

https://marianeris.wordpress.com/2015/02/25/calvinos-exactitude/

Day 10 NaNo 2024

 

Note on Day 10 

So this is probably it for me on drafting for NaNo. I have reached 15,248 words which is 60 pages of good text. However, it is time to pause and revise. This morning I printed it off and made notes on things I need to change and things I need to revise badly. Not editing. Please people, I am not talking editing. I feel very good about this. 60 good pages in 10 days is awesome for me. It means I can do 120 good pages a month and that's been my initial goal for writing from now on. One can write a book a year at that pace. And I needed to find a pace where I did not have neck aches, headaches, or strained eyes. Usually I overdo work and find myself physically ill or working at a pace I cannot maintain. And the entire point is to create a doable habit. I am continuing and will be posting my little NaNo things, but they will be called Drafting Notebook 2024-25. One of the issues I had this year with using the NaNo Tracker is it no longer has the graph that I used last year, where I can just pull it up and see days and word counts for each day. That was important for me and why I wanted to track on NaNo. Now I have to keep my own. And if I do that, why use NaNo. As far as I can tell that's gone. If anybody can find it, let me know. Laughing. Also if someone reads this and knows of another word tracker that does daily tracks and keeps that track available, let me know. 

The beginning of the book, this new section I had to write, before I got to Part 11 is about 120 pages so I am half done as far as drafting. However, that is not exactly what I want for myself at this point. I want a revised, very good draft of Part I with the new structure, and all the little extras. I have some diary entries, some small sections that are vignettes, and these have not been incorporated. I want to do that. I want it to look as close to the vision of a printed book. That's how I work. I divide the book into parts and draft and revise those parts as I go. This is my compromise with my old system of revising every single day as I go. Old habits are hard to break. Part of me will always be revising something as I go but I do relax a bit and just draft. But not crappy drafts. I simply don't have the personality to do that and I fail time and time again. When you do the same thing over and over and it's mistake. Stop. Laughing. I finally stopped. Psychologically that kind of draft ends up being such a mess for me that I just put it aside. I did keep last year's draft because it was not that bad. But damn, I created a new subplot, changed the MMC, changed other characters, moved the setting to historical from contemporary and even how the novel is structured. So there. Now you see why I have to revise as I go. Otherwise I am writing a new book. Laughing. I am not the only writer to do this. Susan Dennard, Laini Taylor, Alexandra Bracken, and well William Faulkner work this way, all from notes or a plot, constantly revising in the process. There is no right or wrong. There is only a method that will get an author to the finish line. I am desperate for that finishing line.

I am going to pause too right now and read three books. My Sweet Folly by Laura Kinsale, The Wild Huntress by Emily Lloyd-Jones, and finish up The Once and Future Witches by Alix Harrow. I am making notes with these books. Learning.

The biggest change in fiction since I had career in it is style and emotional impact. Otherwise known as voice. Laughing. This is the big thing and what will get you read or bought — or rejected. I have spent a lot of time practicing writing to improve my skills and give my voice it's power.

Words to date: 15,248

Music: Summertime Madness and Wildfire by SYML and a 2 minute instrumental by London Grammar. I had popcorn chicken and a baked sweet potato. Treat: a small Coke. Lots of water. Feelings: Good but I am very tired. This last week was a bit overwhelming.

Day 9 NaNo 2024

 

Notes: When I finished Day 5 of NaNo, I had a total of 11,040 words. I was not able to keep up with any notes this week, mostly due to the election. When I was not dealing with that, I had to go to the doctor for my six month check up, buy groceries, and deal with how I felt about the election. I managed to spend some time thinking about it, what I felt had happened, and how I really felt about it. I also had to deal with other people who needed to talk.  From there to now, I have written some decent words, the last two days doing just enough to finish scenes and get to a point where I wanted to stop a bit and read. So it's Day 9 and I have a total of 14,356 words. I have not posted this previously but when I get to the end of Part 1 in this book, I will be revising again. I try to revise and write new words every other day and I have managed to do that. But it's getting smaller as I struggle with developing character and put in a lot of other little details. I can't just have notes. I have to have it in the text. I don't want this draft to be too rough as I will be disenchanted with it. I have to see part of my vision. I cannot do crappy first drafts. I won't finish. I won't use them. This is a psychological thing, of course, but it is the way I work. However, I am working and will continue to post my notes here. I just feel I am going to end up with about 25,000 words for the entire month and not 50,000. Laughing. But I knew that. Today I only wrote about 380 new words, and yesterday I think it was only 640 words. So now I am winding down as I get into the story. My goal for NaNo was to create a new beginning for the old draft I had and I am doing that. So pleased. WORDS: 14,356 words MUSIC: I am still on Line of Fire by Junip. Remember my songs are for certain scenes and points in the draft. They are not just sound. Food: Blackeye Peas and Cornbread. A plain chicken sandwich. Lots of tea and water. Where: Working at my desk. Also in notebbok. Feelings: I am fair. I have not felt good today. I am crashing from the election. 

Dancing on the Gorgon

This is. And thou art. There is no safety. There is no end. The word must be heard in silence. There must be darkness to see the stars. The dance is always danced above the hollow place, above the terrible abyss.

— Ursula K LeGuin

#thegorgon

My Statement on the Election of Trump Nov 2024

Part of me cannot believe this has happened. It's so against logic and good and common sense that I find myself bewildered. But if this can happen, (and it did) anything can. And I mean anything. And if you don't think this is a major earthquake for the US and Europe and even more, you are sadly wrong. So wrong, that I have pity for you. There will be consequences. It is not only tragic for us, but for the world. Trump is a pathological monster. He will seek revenge as all pathological narcissists do. His fractured ego will drive him. And perhaps, you are all going to see what 'good country people' can really do while they are failing. Half the American voters in this country are obviously desperate, fearful people hoping that populist ideology will fix or mitigate their pains from modernity. It will not. The past will not provide anchors that these people want or alter the course of technology. I am a long arc personality. That's how I see history but we are facing some serious challenges in our quest for freedom and fairness. As it has been in all of history, a backlash is upon us. We are a country split in two. We are in the middle of a war of ideas where one side of the nation truly believes their way of life is under threat and the other side does not, but all of us are shaky when it comes to the same things, our homes, our jobs, our families, our children. This was not an election won on economics or common sense, but on cultural ideas alone. But no one is really winning on these cultural debates. It is a scrabble on the lawn. I am not naive. People are going to get hurt in this scrabble over identity, abortion, religion, and immigration and this is partly due to the fact that the cultural Left has dominance and the cultural Right feels under attack. But cultural identity politics is not something you can simply put back in the bottle and plug the top, not even with laws and cranky conservative men on the Supreme Court. But it does create weaknesses for us and democracy, what I call soft powers gone amok and the spoiler country is Russia. We are living in an unpredictable environment regardless of our cultural beliefs. And Russia is powerful and motivated enough to ruin any geopolitical stability. They have, in the Ukrainian War. People often look at that war as nothing to do with them, especially in rural areas in our country where people are struggling against change and culture. So far, by his actions and words, Trump has cast his influence with Putin. And I could say that all narcissists envy other narcissists and Trump wants to be feared like Putin, but it's much more complex than that. Russia doesn't care about our democracy or our liberal scrabble on the lawn over cultural issues. Neither does China. The strain of our scrabbles may become cracks where Russia and China actually find ways to alter and bring a halt to our march toward progress. It is going to get messy and we are going to feel its pain. That said, in some ways, despite our setback from this election, I am still hopeful. Think about it, the Ukrainians are suffering and dying every day against a huge power— for freedom and I do not believe, for a moment, that populist ideology will help the half of this country that prefers Trump over the reforming, centrist ideas of the Biden led administration. These people will get up today and think eggs and chicken prices will go down, taxes will be lower, that radical thoughts coming out of universities will be crushed, that liberals will be deterred from what they call killing babies. It simply won't happen. Because one thing is clear, we all want to be free and we all desire the ability to make free choices. That drive is more powerful than Trump or Putin or the pressures of China and the religious revenge of Islamic terrorism. In psychology, there is a certain 'anxiety' that comes with freedom, with rest, with democratic success. This is what we are all experiencing. This is what Trump has exploited, what every authoritarian exploits. No amount of economics will solve a crisis that is based around cultural change. We are going to fight it out and work to build a new civic culture in the future. I have often said here and in many other conversations that while we are always walking in the shadows of the past, we are moving forward into the future and the future wins. Change is as inevitable as sunrises and sunsets. But so are conflicts and even bigger wars. The 20th century taught us that. I want the Left to know one thing from this, bottom up is always better and for years now we have been working from above. Remember that. You cannot force people into a future they fear and do not understand. You have to ease them along. This will not be popular but it's pragmatic and realistic. It doesn't help, really, knowing any of this now. At present, I believe we all feel a little powerless and disgusted. I know I do. But I don't want liberty to fail. As long as we have some sort of liberty we can fight and make anew. We can make meaning. We can rise. We will face The Gorgon.

Do the deed and find purpose, joy, and peace in the doing.

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

          — Theodore Roosevelt

Day 4 NaNo 2024

 

NaNo Note Day 4: Wow, I have made four days with some pretty interesting writing. Today I mainly revised for hours and hours, trying to set something up that was necessary on the heroine. Since it's mental illness, it was not that easy. Because some is subtext and it's what she does and how she does that shows it. — HARD WORK. I also felt I could not move on until I had established this personality. The image is Frederic Leighton's painting of a young woman and the heroine looks like this and she ends up in a pale blue dress like this. She has emotional issues. But they are hard to write. One never knows how to really describe mental illness in a book. Many authors go a bit overboard with this but I realized from research, that things are a bit more subtle.Also these are not personality disorder issues or anything moving into serious psychological issues. They are mainly anxiety disorders and one issue I will not name. I attempted this in an old book of mine and well, I felt it often made the heroine look meek or weak or something similar and I had no intention of repeating that. But I think they are similar heroines. They are both very courageous human beings. There is nothing like being fearless when you are afraid. That's a brave person. It took me three hours just to wrangle with the scene to get it right, to nail down her situation and how the MMC reacted to it. I know I will go over it a dozen more times but for now I can move on and I did, writing 1500 very rough words for the next scene. This I will revise tomorrow into some manageable form. I am not an author who can do really crappy drafts. I end up not using them at all. So I have devised a scheme on how to write every day (normally 5 days a week) and finish a book revising mostly as I go so that I have a really good draft of the story. We learn a lot about the MMC too. I had to revise and revise his scene. I had to put several little things (important details for future) in place. I have notecards for these little things. Because they will make sense later in story. I like my characters. More on them later. WORDS, 1803 total. Most of them so crappy I have to revise ASAP to go on. SONG: Line of Fire by Junip Food: Cream of Wheat for Breakfast. Slice of Toast for snack. 5 Popcorn Chicken and Asparagus for main meal. Tea. Water. Feelings: I am stressed over the Election more than my WIP.

Day 3 NaNo 2024

 

Day 3 Notes: What a day! I had a serious of other tasks to complete today before the Monday work week began. Time fell back and I still got up at the same time, only it was too early. I tried to go back to sleep. I ended up getting up and working some, but broke for other work, just catching bits and pieces of time to write on WIP. At lunch at 10. Day was long and crazy. I did manage to do exactly what I wanted to do. I repaired the ending just as I wrote yesterday and created a new conflict thread and raised the tension. I fleshed out the female protagonists dilemma and interiority. Strong foundation. Pleased. There are some weak sections. I highlighted them for revision later. The next two sections are critical. Songs: Continuation of Iris by Goo Doll and Hurdy Gurdy Man by Donovan. Same day stuff. Where: Writing at my trusty desk for good luck. Food: Baked Potato, Grill Cheese, Half Hamburger Patty, Zucchini microwaved. Tea and lots of water. 4 big bottles. Feelings: I feel a lot better about the text today than I did yesterday because I revised and added nearly 2000 words to existing scenes. That's how I roll when I am working really well.

Day 2 NaNo 2024

 

Note: Day 2 NaNo: This was a day where I had to incorporate three sections, just a little over a good paragraph a piece from the old draft. That's not as easy as one thinks. It's just not copying and pasting, because the situation and scene it is placed in is nothing like the other and not even the same people and the conversation needs so much more than was never even conceived of when I was writing the previous draft. It was here that I introduced my main protagonist, a young woman (girl) of 18. In a month and few days, she will turn 19. She is named for the flower in the graphic, as her mother had a similar name. We also see the place where she works and what she does, and some of her challenges. This piece is filled with conflict and raises a lot of questions and I see myself revising it before I even finish NaNo. It's that important. The characters are being developed, the situation posed. It was extremely difficult work to place all these details naturally. I floundered at the end. The last 100 words are just not that good. Revision is needed as soon as possible. I want a sharper ending that shows a new conflict growing. I see this in my mind now and have made a comment of it on a post note. First thing I do tomorrow. Words: 2387.: Hurdy Gurdy Man by Donovan. Iris by Goo Goo Dolls. Food: Breakfast Eggs and Biscuits. Tea. Supper: Turkey Sandwich and some Ruffles and French Onion Dip. Water. Where: I wrote at home at my favorite writing desk which is a big trestle table I bought when 18 years old with my own money. Feelings: This is a lot of damn work and I must be crazy to do it.